Her reception as Hermione, in _Andromaque_, in March 1774, was the first sign of the coming storm. According to the _Mémoires secrets_, the acting all round on this occasion left a good deal to be desired; but the public, who had just learned that Mlle. Raucourt was living openly with the Marquis de Bièvre, concentrated its resentment upon her, and she was loudly hissed. The hostile demonstrations grew more frequent and more pronounced in proportion as the actress’s irregularities became more notorious. Nevertheless, so long as there was nothing worse than innumerable gallantries with which to reproach her, she was not without supporters in the pit, whose acclamations served to counteract, if not entirely to drown, the cries of the malcontents. Presently, however, ugly rumours began to spread--rumours which attributed to the young _tragédienne_ the shameful vices of ancient Greece, and which, there is reason to believe, were but too well justified.[111] Every one now turned against her; those who had been loudest in chanting her praises were now foremost in ridicule and abuse, and such was the general odium which she had contrived to excite that she counted herself fortunate if her appearance on the stage was received in silence. “Never,” wrote Grimm, “was idol worshipped with more infatuation; never was idol broken with more contempt.” There was, however, a slight reaction in her favour when, on October 30, 1775, she appeared as the Statue, in the _Pygmalion_ of Jean Jacques Rousseau. “She was truly beautiful in this pose,” says the critic of the _Mémoires secrets_. “It is considered the most successful part she has yet undertaken.” And La Harpe writes: “This rôle, which would be suitable for so few women, is precisely that which is most becoming to Mlle. Raucourt. The only thing required of her is to be beautiful, and in that she is a complete success. It is impossible to imagine a more seductive vision than this actress, as she poses on her pedestal at the moment when the veil which has hitherto covered her is drawn aside. Her head was that of Venus, and her leg, half-discovered, that of Diana.”[112]